Posted by Lane Burt in Living Sustainably , Solving Global Warming , U.S. Law and Policy
Home Star will reach another mile stone today when Rep. Peter Welch (D-Vt.), Chairman Ed Markey (D-Mass.), Rep. Vern Ehlers (R-Mich.) and Rep. Dennis Cardoza (D-Calif.) introduce legislation creating the program in the House of Representatives. It’s important to note...
Posted by Lane Burt in Solving Global Warming , U.S. Law and Policy
Remember when I asked you to take action and tell the Department of Energy to set a better standard for residential water heaters? Well, just shy of 10,000 of you responded and it made a difference. DOE heard all of...
Posted by Lane Burt in Green Enterprise , Solving Global Warming , U.S. Law and Policy
My fellow efficiency advocates and I have spent countless hours over the last year negotiating with manufacturers of every appliance and piece of equipment imaginable, trying to reach agreements on what the next energy standards will look like. These standards...
Posted by Lane Burt in U.S. Law and Policy
Last year’s Recovery Act left some confusion about states’ commitments to improve building energy codes. As discussed in previous blogs, when Governors accepted Recovery Act funds they agreed to update and enforce their state building energy codes, but controversy in...
Posted by Lane Burt in U.S. Law and Policy
Most of us only think about water heaters when forced to take a cold shower – shudder – but those boring tanks in the basement actually account for up to 25% of the energy used in your home. No surprise...
Posted by Lane Burt in U.S. Law and Policy
As mentioned previously in this blog, as a condition of receiving money from the Recovery Act, all Governors had to agree to make some efficiency improvements, namely by updating their building energy codes and adjusting their utility rate structures to...
Posted by Lane Burt in U.S. Law and Policy
Last week the Department of Energy (DOE) and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) on the Energy Star program. Who runs Energy Star, the extremely successful program for promoting efficient appliances, equipment, and buildings, and...
Posted by Lane Burt in U.S. Law and Policy
NRDC and other efficiency groups released a negotiated agreement with manufacturers of residential air conditioners and furnaces yesterday, marking the end of a journey to come to consensus that lasted many months. I negotiated on NRDC's behalf and we will...
Posted by Lane Burt in U.S. Law and Policy
Yesterday President Obama signed a sweeping Executive Order that instructs all agencies to step up efforts to cut greenhouse gas emissions and save energy and water. This isn't the first time that the inefficiency of federal facilities has received attention,...
Posted by Lane Burt in U.S. Law and Policy
There was an excellent article in the NY Times last Sunday, detailing the unexpected rise of super-efficient incandescent light bulbs as a result of the standard in the 2007 energy bill. The article quotes our own lighting and electronics efficiency...
Posted by Lane Burt in U.S. Law and Policy
DOE released the funding distribution for the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grants (EECBG) from the recovery act (ARRA) late last week. With this action, we now know as much as we are going to about the destination of the...
Posted by Lane Burt in Health and the Environment , Living Sustainably , Solving Global Warming , U.S. Law and Policy
I have blogged a couple times about the current rulemaking on lamps (bulbs) being undertaken by the Department of Energy. I won't rehash much, but it is the largest potential energy saver of any appliance standard in the program's history....
Posted by Lane Burt in Curbing Pollution , Solving Global Warming , U.S. Law and Policy
President Obama issued a memo today to the Department of Energy on appliance efficiency standards requiring that, a) The Department meet all their deadlines to issue standards between now and Aug 8th and,b) Accelerate the process for standards with deadlines...
Posted by Lane Burt
The Bush administration released new efficiency standards for commercial refrigeration equipment on Friday, finalizing the levels they proposed last October. This standard covers the refrigerated display units used in grocery stores and gas stations. You can find the full document...
